Sunday, August 24, 2003

Brother Alcoholic Calls Sister Alcoholic Day!

It's been 18 months since Jenny called Dave, 18 months of really good drinking.

"I used to call my brother every night just crying and threatening to kill myself. Drinking really sucked for me back then, I think it started after our dad died. It was just that kind of drinking where you drink until you can't feel anything anymore. Then you drink some more to try and feel something."

What changed?

"Not sure. One day, drinking just turned real good again. I met a guy, and I was afraid it all hinged on him being around. But that fell through not soon after we met and I came out fine. Just kept drinking most nights, and feeling pretty okay most days. Have a lotta friends now too."

What about your brother?

"I keep meaning to call him. I should, you know. Because I only called him at my worst hour of the night and I know he got so sick of it. It'd be nice to talk to Dave when I'm feeling okay. I can't this afternoon though. I'm away on a canoeing weekend."

It's been 3 weeks since Dave slept more than four and a half hours in a night.

Dave?

"What."

You don't look so good.

"I don't sleep lately. I'll drink enough to pass out right away, but then it's like after three and a half or four hours, my body's sober and my eyes just pop open."

Maybe you should take a break for a while.

"I need to. But the sleeplessness just leaves me feeling like I'm made of ashes. And I end up drinking at night just to end the day feeling a little different than I felt all day. But then I just feel like I'm made of wet ashes."

Any idea why it all started?

"No. Well, some friends, this couple that I was really close to. They split up and they're both moving out of town. So there's been a lot of goodbye things for them over the past few weeks, lotta staying out till 4. But I do that all the time. Just sometimes, I'll have a bad week for a while. It's like there's a switch that gets flicked and all of a sudden, drinking blows. And then one day, I accidentally flick the switch the other way and drinking's okay again."

Mmm.

"But a little lost sleep. This is nothing. My sister's the one who needs to quit. She used to call every night threatening to eat a bunch of pills. Haven't heard from her in a while though. I called her up the last few nights, just to see if she's doing okay, but there was no answer at her house. I was always there when she'd call me at 3 in the morning."